Monster Hunter: The Fifth Bullet, Part 1

This story was made using the solo RPG: Monster Hunter, by La esquina del rol.

The lake water looked cold, but the singer payed it no mind.

The rising sun was slowly warming the nighttime air, the first piercing rays striking the singer full in the face, but it paid no mind to the sun either. It’s eyes had long since rotted away to a shriveled milky white. Loose teeth rattled in its skull as its head fell from side to side, while a sound that was half moan and half hymn drifting across the gently rippling lake. They had died years ago. Now, all they were was a fountain of suffering that drew the living and trapped them in their own nightmares.

As for the living, there were ten of them at least. They rocked back and forth, their eyes squeezed tight, their faces frozen masks of pain, fear, and despair.

Vic rubbed her mouth as she studied the scene from her hiding spot. It would be hard to get everyone away from the monster without being seen, but the walking dead were harder to kill than most. Besides, she was running low on supplies and would still have to get the ten people back home.

Humans didn’t last long in the Borderlands. Pockets of air throughout the land could made you sick if you breathed too deep. Monsters hunted silently, and claimed their pray with sudden and clear fierceness. The few who survived for any length of time did so because of either extensive training or a guide who had the same, and they rarely stayed longer than a week before returning to the safety of civilization. If the ten people were to survive, Vic would have to protect them.

Vic opened her pack and pulled out the last of her herbs. Surely, she had to have something useful that could keep the weathered zombie busy while they all fled…sage, wolfsbane, a small amount of hemlock and a smaller amount of nightshade. Vic pulled the last piece of hawthorn root out of its small vial, followed by a small dried yew twig. Yes, she could put something together with this…

The art of magic was a strange thing. Ancient native rituals were mixed with modern science and legends from the old world. Spirits and sprites whispered secrets into welcoming ears, who taught others before anyone realized they had been driven mad. Old folk-tales and rumors blended perfectly with ancient practice and new-found mysticism to create horrible miracles.

All of this was to say, even the Hunters didn’t know everything, and oftentimes they were stuck doing what they could with what they had. Vic had always been skilled with the rifle and hatchet, but her way around herbs and magics had always had room for improvement.

So it was that after Vic had pulled the last of the ten people out of the singer’s circle, the charm gave way. The sightless eyes slowly turned to face the huddled captives, and the gnarled body began to shakily reach out towards them, the voice of the dead singing all the louder.

Vic didn’t need to shout for them to run, they were already fleeing with a mad panic that made it difficult for Vic to corral them. Thankfully, her voice was clear and strong enough that before long, the eleven of them were marching quickly away from the shambling singer.

As far as forced marches went, it was better than it could have been. Nevertheless, when Vic reached the town with the ten former captives in tow, she ran straight for the mayor.

“I can scarce believe you done it,” the woman said first, wiping her brow with her arm. “We didn’t think we’d ever see any of them again, but you gone and brought them back.”

“And now you’ve all got to leave,” Vic interrupted. “Head out of the Borderlands, get the whole town up and moving and —”

“Now, hang on,” the mayor held up her hand, “I don’t understand what you’re saying. Leave? Why we gotta leave?”

Vic pointed back the way they had come. “The damn zombie saw us leaving, and it’s been hunting us the whole five miles. It’s on its way right now, and when it gets here you’ll all be in a mess of trouble worse than when I came.”

The mayor blinked, and then her face turned to stone. “Now see here, I appreciate everything you’ve done — reckon we all do — but even if I were inclined to get the whole town up and moving on your say so, I find it hard to believe a Monster Hunter like yourself couldn’t take care of a single dead man.”

Vic licked her lips. It was always hard to talk to average humans about such things. “It ain’t just a dead man,” she began. “Them skeletons out there in the desert, they’re just dead folk, not believin’ they’re dead. Zombies is something else. They’re walkin’ not because they think they’re alive, they’re walkin’ because Old Splitfoot himself wants ’em walkin’. They don’t go down easy, and even if they did, the song it’s singin’ ain’t a quiet one no more. That groaner’s gonna have a whole flock o’ monsters comin’ after it, lookin’ to join in whatever feast it’s brewin’.”

The mayor wiped her brow again. “But…you just got…look at them, ma’am. They’re practically dead on their feet.”

Vic looked at the heartfelt reunions that filled the town center. The ten former captives were indeed exhausted, run nearly ragged by Vic’s forced march. They were doubtlessly hungry and thirsty, and even though the friends and family they thought lost were right in front of them, several were struggling to keep their eyes open.

The townsfolk were tired as well; tired of worrying, of being afraid, of mourning the lost. They swarmed to their freed families and neighbors, crying out their relief. They barely paid attention to Vic.

Vic rubbed her mouth. “The mine,” she said after a moment. “There’s an old abandoned mine just a way south-east o’ here, right? That’s not more than a mile walk, and it’ll keep everyone safe until things quiet down. Anyone who can’ll carry those who can’t.”

The mayor’s protest was cut short by a distant wail. It was a scream of rage and hate, torn up from the bowels of something long lost to the burning pits of hell. It echoed across the sky, the cry of a hunter.

The mayor swallowed and gave a small nod. “Okay…okay, but I…” she found her steel. “I know I ain’t been the most beloved mayor in this town. If I start talkin’ about how we got to go hide in the mines…without some authority to back me up…”

Vic didn’t wait for the mayor to finish; she started shouting, herding the townsfolk like frightened sheep. For all the mayor’s modesty, she knew who was best suited for which task, and few were willing to argue while the echoes of the wail still hung in the air.

The evacuation was surprisingly swift. The zombie hadn’t even crested the hill before everyone was filing out of the town and heading south-east. Even some of the recently freed captives were walking under their own power, though several were being dragged in carts and wheelbarrows. Even accounting for that, they made good time, and they were all hidden inside the mouth of the abandoned mine before the second wail split the air.

Vic sat by the mouth of the mine, listening to the monster’s screams as the townsfolk huddled deeper inside. The zombie was in the town, now, along with whatever had decided to come with it. They’d stay there for a few days at most before moving on, and the locals could return to their homes. Hopefully they had brought enough food and water to last.

Vic glanced back into the darkness of the mine. She could leave at any time, really. They’d be safe enough here, and she’d only be eating into their rations. Besides, she had four bullets. She knew where the sixth one was, but the fifth…

She could feel the cold iron at her side pulling her onward. Her father’s gun drew her like a magnet, further away from the town and towards the east, through…

She looked back again. It led through the mine.

Was the bullet in there? Where? buried deep in the earth for eons, since the angels first drew blood against the demons of hell? Was it brought there mere decades ago, by some strange being under the divine command of an oracle? Had it fallen through some ancient crack?

Vic shouldered her rifle. In the end, it really didn’t matter, did it?

She stopped by the mayor as she left. “Stay for two days at least, maybe three. Then send your fastest and quietest to scout the town to make sure they’re all gone.”

“Wait,” the mayor stood up from their ragged stone seat.

“They may not leave,” Vic continued. “At least, not soon enough before you run out of food. If they stay —”

“Are you not staying?”

Vic’s throat tightened. She could feel Pet’s hand on her cheek. “If they stay, you’ll need to find a new home. Head north, and you’ll get out of the Borderlands eventually.”

“You know very well we wouldn’t last a week out there.”

A day, if they were lucky. But if the monsters hadn’t moved on then what could Vic do? Nothing but offer vain hope to a townfull of doomed souls.

But if she moved on, if she worked swiftly…

“I’m sorry,” she said, “but I have business elsewhere, and you don’t need my help. You’ve got all I can give.”

“Where are you going?” The mayor’s sotto whisper piered the silent mine as Vic headed deeper into the darkness.

She might have given an answer, if she had known.